Making Home Saturday Series: Building Home (Session 2)

A wooden structure stands in a gallery installation in a museum. The image is bordered by light purple. Red text reads Making Home at the bottom of the image. In black text, it reads Smithsonian Design Triennial.

Making Home Saturday Series: Building Home (Session 2)
A TOhono O’odham Native food tasting and garden celebration
April 26, 2025 – Tasting 12:00 p.m. to 2:00 P.m., Table displays 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Join us for a Native food tasting and garden celebration that will share uses of seasonal plants as food and constructive materials of the Tohono O’odham Nation’s Alexander Pancho Farm in Sells, Arizona. 

In their Triennial installation titled We:sic ’em ki: (Everybody’s Home), master basket weaver and activist Terrol Dew Johnson (1971–2024, Tohono O’odham Nation; active Sells, Arizona) and architects Aranda/Lasch give us a glimpse into a future home they are building with local desert materials from the ancestral O’odham land adjacent to the family’s Alexander Pancho Memorial Farm including fragrant mesquite trees, saguaro cactus ribs, and clay-rich soil. We:sic ’em ki: embraces an essential tenet of the O’odham Himdag structure—to live and build regeneratively into the future—and will serve as a model for art, activism, and sustainable desert living. 

During this session, participants will get to taste various recipes made using traditional ingredients from the farm while learning more about Native food ways and history from farmer Noland Johnson and traditional singer Michael Enis. 

Drop in throughout the day to Cooper Hewitt’s Garden to meet additional Tohono O’odham representatives, including farmer Amy Juan, Mary Paganelli Votto the co-author of From I’itoi’s Garden: Tohono O’odham Food Traditions, and youth farmers from the Pancho Farm community who have created table displays featuring materials, tools, and techniques with support of students from The Cooper Union School of Architecture.

This program is being held as part of the Making Home Saturday Series: Building Home, a day-long, multi-format public program and celebration taking place across the museum’s galleries and garden involving several Making Home—Smithsonian Design Triennial designers and architects. Through food, song, storytelling, and conversation, the participants will share the cultural perspectives, models of environmental advocacy, and systems of Indigenous building they explore in their Making Home commissions. Learn more about the other Sessions.

Register to attend.

About the Speakers

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Benjamin Aranda is a principal at Aranda\Lasch and teaches architectural design at The Cooper Union. Based in New York City and Tucson, Aranda\Lasch critically engages the making of software, objects, and environments while drawing from long-standing histories and cultural traditions.
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Michael David Enis, a member of the Wa:k Community within the San Xavier District on the Tohono O’odham Nation, is a singer, teacher and youth mentor. He preserves and shares Tohono O’odham himdag (traditions) connecting stories and lessons from O’odham songs to strengthen community engagement, growth and belief. As an Instructor at Baboquivari High School he mentors and teaches youth the history of the Tohono O’odham (People of the Desert). Michael has shared his voice and his knowledge of traditional songs with communities around the world.
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Amy R. Juan is from the Tohono O’odham Nation, representing the Nu:wi (Buzzard) Clan. Her roots in O’odham Oidag Himdag (O’odham Agriculture/Foodways) began as a Youth Intern with the Young O’odham United Through Health (Y.O.U.T.H.) Program with Tohono O’odham Community Action, then eventually became a coordinator where she co-created Project Oidag, a two year intensive agriculture internship. As an advocate for O’odham Food and Seed Sovereignty, she has worked with the International Indian Treaty Council, an Indigenous Peoples Human Rights Organization, educating and raising awareness of impacts of climate change on desert foods and seeds at the United Nations. She is a strong advocate for seed rematriation and has successfully initiated seed returns to O’odham farmers and families. Amy currently works with the San Xavier Cooperative Farm on the Tohono O’odham Nation as the Administration Manager.
A person with short, dark hair wearing a white short sleeved shirt stands in a field of crops. The background is light blue sky.
Noland Johnson (Tohono O’odham) is the Owner/Manager of Alexander Pancho Memorial Farm, his family’s 60-acre traditional dry land family farm. Growing traditional O’odham crops using only monsoon rain water on the Tohono O’odham Nation, the farm also serves as a training farm for local, beginning and established farmers. Carrying on his family’s traditions, Noland has decades of hands-on experience in dry farming/ak ciñ techniques and in the planting, harvesting and foraging of traditional Tohono O’odham desert foods. He mentors and shares his knowledge through internships and farm visits, as well as talks with schools, universities, agriculture programs, museums and food sovereignty organizations throughout the country.
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Chris Lasch is a principal at Aranda\Lasch and President of the School of Architecture, founded by Frank Lloyd Wright in Scottsdale, Arizona. Aranda\Lasch’s work is part of the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and The Art Institute of Chicago, among others. Recognition includes the United States Artists Award, the Architecture League Emerging Voices Award, and the Graham Foundation.
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Mary Paganelli Votto is the co-author with Elder Frances Manuel of From I’itoi’s Garden: Tohono O’odham Food Traditions, a comprehensive and respectful look at the foodways of the Tohono O’odham, drawing upon the wisdom of scores of community members with step-by-step directions on how to grow traditional crops and harvest wild foods … nutritional information … songs, legends and personal reflections … and traditional & contemporary recipes. She is the author of The Food Lovers’ Guide to Tucson, founder/editor of Native Foodways Magazine, and was the Consulting Chef for the Desert Rain Cafe. Mary holds a BA from Vassar College and Master Certificates in Cooking and Baking from the New School.

Accessibility & What to Expect

Format: The program will begin with a brief welcome, then the speakers will engage in a presentation. Attendees will be standing and able to visit the table displays. Food tastings will be served on a first come, first served basis. 

About the space: This program will take place in Cooper Hewitt’s Garden. It is fully wheelchair accessible. There is an accessible restroom available inside the museum. Read more about accessibility at Cooper Hewitt. 

Accommodations: If we can provide additional services to support your participation, email us at CHEducation@si.edu or let us know when you register. Please make your request as far in advance as possible—preferably at least ten days before the program date.  

Special Thanks

Making Home—Smithsonian Design Triennial is presented in collaboration with Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. This project received federal support from the Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative Pool, administered by the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum; the Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino; the Asian Pacific American Initiatives Pool, administered by the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center; and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Generous support is provided by the Henry Luce Foundation and the Terra Foundation for American Art.

Support is also provided by the Lily Auchincloss Foundation; Edward and Helen Hintz; re:arc institute; the Keith Haring Foundation; the Lemberg Foundation; Maharam; and the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts.